Whee!

I won that wheelchair last week for £95 including postage. It arrived Monday morning. It is a tilt in space and reclining self propel wheelchair, and it is much better for me than the old one. I am too tall for it really, but we use a pillow on the headrest and I don’t mind my legs sticking out a bit so it is fine. Went to the local shop and other than really needing a hat as the sun was so bright even with sunglasses (as I was tilted back a bit it was more in my eyes than it otherwise would have been) it went really well. I won’t be able to have it fully reclined when travelling on public transport as it makes it really long, but I can have it tilted and a little bit reclined on there which will help a lot. As I’m tilted I also don’t need the harness to hold me up with it 🙂

New care agency is still working really well. My main carer (Johan is calling her Lovely Carer) is absolutely brilliant. She does have a tendency to stay over time, but it feels almost like having a friend over than a carer (though she does help me with my personal care and any tasks we need her to do). She was off on Friday as she had a funeral to go to and it was her weekend off, so we got three other carers then (that is apparently too many and is unusual- I still think 4 in one week is much better than 15…). All three of them were really nice and lovely and talked to me like a human being, rather than being patronising. I did miss a couple of times as my sleeping pattern threw itself out (one night of insomnia where I didn’t get to sleep until 7am) but the carer then (the manager) was just worried that it was because it was someone I didn’t know. When I did meet her in the evening she was really nice and we were able to tell her how happy we are with things 🙂

Sunday night we did both have a bit of a meltdown due to another new carer coming when Johan was meant to be raiding. Was silly in the end as the raid didn’t happen and the carer was lovely, it was just I didn’t want to have to deal with a completely new person by myself. That was one of the problems with the old agency- there were constantly new carers that I didn’t know so neither of us were comfortable with it. As the new agency thinks 4 carers in a week is too many I know things are going to be better. This week we’re only seeing Lovely Carer as she comes both morning and evening and is working this week. She seemed rather excited about that (she seems to like coming here as much as we like her coming 🙂 ).

Meggy and Martin (my youngest siblings) came to visit last Tuesday, and also cleaned most of the kitchen and living room for us, which was very nice of them. Meggy has said she wants to come back this week to finish it off. This is not a problem with us. She’s very good at it 🙂 Johan was terrified to begin with as he felt really guilty but he was okay after she got here and when she actually did it.

To also help, we finally have the council cleaners almost sorted! We’ll be having a cleaner in 2 hours a week to do the main cleaning jobs, and they should be starting next week some time. We’re just waiting for them to tell us when it’ll be. This is a paid service, but at £10.41 an hour it will be well worth it for Johan to stop worrying and for me to be able to have the place clean how I want it. I can pretend it’s because we’re really posh and stuff (my DLA covers it as it’s because of my disability I can’t do it myself). Lovely carer can also do smaller jobs inbetween (washing a few dishes, putting a load of washing in) so between the two services it will work well.

Last week I also sent an email in the middle of the night about the neighbours upstairs while they were making a massive amount of noise fighting. Johan was terrified lying on my bed next to me, but I got angry instead for once, so sent the email. The local estate officer is coming out on Wednesday to discuss this. We’re not exactly wanting to complain, we just want to do what’s necessary to make it stop (though that might require a complaint). We have a simple way of judging if it’s just oversensitivity or actual loud noise- if I can still hear it with my ear defenders on, it’s very loud (and the stuff we can’t tolerate is arguments, stomping, throwing things and slamming doors, rather than normal chatting, television watching or listening to music, though we don’t like the drilling at midnight either).

I’m still doing pretty well. Been on my computer (in new chair!) and though I didn’t play World of Warcraft I did get a message sent in the Ayme forums, which took about 2 hours for me to write because it is very hard work for me. I don’t know why because writing to people on forums used to be easy. I also went on Facebook for a bit.

On Thursday I hope to go into Grainger Market in Newcastle to get some nice food. There is a lovely bakery in there called French Oven and the bread and macarons are gorgeous. They are doing special flavours for the Jubilee so I have ordered two of each flavour for us of the macarons (16 in total) and two high tea boxes. As I have my new chair I am hoping to go there myself but if not Johan will go for me. I am looking forward to it 🙂

I have been enjoying the nice weather but my body has been responding oddly to it. For a while I needed lots of anti nausea tablets which is not like me and my body couldn’t decide whether it was hot or cold or both, but I have finally adapted. I think it was the change in weather. I have been watching the birds outside my window with it open, and it has been lovely. Luckily my window is shaded by lots of trees so it doesn’t get too hot in my room.

I hope things keep going well. I am liking my new chair giving me more freedom to go out 🙂